You’ll find all the modern vocabulary of Premier League managerial recruitment swirling around Manchester United’s pursuit of Ruben Amorim.
He’s a ‘sought-after young manager’ with a ‘stellar reputation’ and ‘the brightest of the hugely promising generation of young Portuguese coaches.’ His ‘stock is rising fast.’
Sorry to ruin this party, but he’s actually won the Portuguese league title twice in four years and the Portuguese League Cup three times. When his Sporting Lisbon side played Ajax at home in a Champions League group stage game in September 2021, his players were blown away in a 5-1 defeat. The Dutch team’s manager that night? The soon-to-be sought-after Erik ten Hag.
We also presently witness Amorim being praised to the heavens because of his uncanny knack for ‘developing young players.’ Which I rather thought was supposed to be the prerequisite of any coach.
Such objections to the received wisdom are an inconvenience at times like this. Along with numbers showing Amorim’s win ratio to be 71.7 per cent, while Ten Hag’s win ratio when United hired him was 73.49 per cent. Options are few and everyone is looking to the latest kid on the block. The new flavour of the month.
There’s nothing wrong with recruiting relatively unproven overseas managers. So many, from Mauricio Pochettino to Roberto de Zerbi, have upended expectations. But this is not a breezy South Coast beach scene we’re talking about. It’s the raging, tempest of Manchester United, where managers and their reputations have routinely been devoured whole these past 11 years, before stepping on the first private jet out of the place. It’s the most difficult and complex crisis management role in world football. A task demanding someone with a material understanding of the white heat, the unyielding scrutiny and relentless impatience.
Instead, United look a whole lot like a club stuck in a continuous loop, going back to a manager whom they actually decided six months ago was not for them. Liverpool, Aston Villa and West Ham have also all passed up on the chance to recruit Amorim, or at least speak to his agents.
Please let’s dispense with any pretence about one of the prime motivations behind such a change of heart by the geniuses currently running this club. It’s a fear of missing out to Manchester City. United want Amorim because City supposedly want Amorim. Which, you would have to say, is hardly blue sky thinking.
The notion of the Portuguese having a future at the Etihad has been tangible since it was announced that Hugo Viana, the director of football with whom he has formed a close partnership at Sporting Lisbon, will succeed Txiki Begiristain, when the Spaniard steps down from that role at City next summer.
Amorim’s original intention had been to see out this season at Sporting and examine his options at the end of it, because they might have included linking up with Viana in Manchester, should Pep Guardiola walk away with Begiristain. City’s interest still seemed an obstacle just a week ago. United’s moves to pre-empt that included meeting Amorim during the international break earlier this month, for talks at which at least three of their executives were present.
For City, recruiting Amorim to replace Guardiola would not represent an overwhelming risk, because he would be one significant cog in a well-oiled football structure, where the manager is asked to cohere to an agreed playing philosophy. It’s a structure which insulates a club from swinging wildly from one system to another, simply to fit the coach. It’s what progressive modern football executive oversight looks like.
It’s also precisely the kind of structure you imagined INEOS would have established at United when recruiting Omar Berrada as chief executive from City, in January, and Dan Ashworth as sporting director from Newcastle United, in July, with Jason Wilcox, former City academy director, arriving as technical director last Spring.
United are in desperate need of such a structure, though there is no evidence of one. At Old Trafford, Amorim will expect to be free to introduce his own playing philosophy – a 3-4-3 formation. And he will be reluctant to compromise on that, as Liverpool discovered when considering him as Jurgen Klopp’ successor this summer, and opting for Arne Slot instead, by some distance.
United’s squad does not lend itself to playing with a back three and wing-backs. They currently have no natural, fit left wing back. And having blown the bank on average Dutch players for Ten Hag last summer, they do not have money to spend in January, either.
Who was the right manager for United? This looks and feels like a club in need of a Carlo Ancelotti figure – as if – to instil sense and calm and bring coherence. The place exudes unhappiness to its core, with ancillary staff departing in the latest redundancy rounds describing a deep sense of hurt about a classless way things have been brought to an end.
Graham Potter, out of a functioning football environment for too long, has been nowhere near consideration by United. Gareth Southgate – who would have brought maturity and sense – would not have gone down well in the court of public opinion. Xavi had Spanish ambitions to fulfil. Maintaining Ruud van Nistelrooy in an extended interim capacity, whilst INEOS reset and put some structure in place, would have made more sense than this punt on inexperience.
It wasn’t to be. United just couldn’t wait. Change is in the air again at a club which has seems pathologically incapable of intelligent evolution. The new execs will power up the rollercoaster and crash on.
Real Madrid's Ballon d'Or no-show was classless
It’s hard to recall a more classless act than Real Madrid’s refusal to show up for the Ballon d’Or awards on Tuesday night because the player prize had gone to Manchester City’s Rodri, rather than Vinicius Junior.
The players said they would not go where they are ‘not respected’, despite winning the club award.
Sad to see the great club of Alfredo di Stefano, Ferenc Puskas, Francico Gento and Zinedine Zidane, boiling in its own bitterness and spite.
Golf is reaching new audiences
There was a time when club golf was remote and exclusive place, but the turn I took with my grandson last week around the nine-hole, par three course at Styal Golf Club, near us in Cheshire, was a reminder of why it has found new audiences and thrives.
The boy has not long started picking up clubs - this was our third time around – and for me, there’s been an inbuilt worry about him digging out large chunks of fairway. The welcome and encouragement from the staff could not have been greater.
And the nine shots I needed to exit the bunker at the fifth, reminiscent of that old Hamlet cigar ad, added considerably to his enthusiasm.
England must acknowledge Bazball flaws
It's the response in the worst of times which is the true gauge of greatness in sport.
Ben Stokes has been garlanded with praise these past few years, yet amid the desultory performances in Pakistan, we’ve witnessed his loss of cool as England’s fielding fell apart in the second test, his distraction and aimlessness in the field during the third and a distinct reluctance to discuss anything off the field.
Bazball has brought much joy but its practitioners’ refusal to acknowledge the flaws and failings is its least appealing trait. It smacks of swagger and ego.
